Any other symptoms that you haven't mentioned? Any rashes? 'Brain-fog?' Changes in bowel habits? Have you been tested for food intolerances or celiac disease? Any GI issues run in your family?View Thread

MsDoyle, one thing you might want to consider trying is to take all dairy products out of your diet for a couple of weeks and see what happens. Some people have an issue with casein - the major protein in diary - and when that occurs one of the big side-effects can be constipation.View Thread

Not sure, but we've run into some similar conditions in the individuals we see in the medical setting I'm at. A lot of individuals walk in with alternating bowel habits, can't breathe, can't stomach food, purported GERD, headaches and a myriad of other symptoms only to find out they have a major issue with gluten. That's a protein found in wheat, rye and barley. It can be severe enough that it does a real job on your GI tract and it makes it appear that a person can't eat anything.

Most of the blood tests for gluten do a poor job of giving answers, and if the docs rely on just those many who do have the problem are told 'you don't have an issue with gluten.'

There's a decent test put out by Enterolab.com that can be done privately. We often use it to 'cross-check' the results on the gluten portion of the IgA/IgG tests that are run in the office - especially when we're suspicious that the IgA results came back negative because a person's total IgA count is too low for them to generate a true response.

It might be worth checking out depending upon any other symptoms you might have.View Thread

I believe you need to look a bit further. If you've haven't already been tested for food intolerances or celiac disease, do so. Many celiacs go through the same symptoms of intense fatigue and joint discomfort in addition to 'brain fog' and rashes. But you don't have to have all clear-cut symptoms to have celiac or other food intolerance issues.

If you'd like to check out the celiac factor for yourself - because the blood tests for celiac are notorious for coming up with false negatives - take a look at the enterolab.com website. It's been a boon to many suffering with symptoms but a lack of diagnosis. Many celiacs - including my husband - got an answer that changed their life for the better.

He had that 'after eating I need to sleep feeling, or I'll fall down.' He went through all the standard tests and was told he was perfectly normal. Not! He's been gluten-free for a number of years now, and he's feeling good, but still deals with some of the left-over damage that was down due to late diagnosis.

I work in the medical setting and brought the test into the office when other tests were giving what clearly seemed to me to be false answers. In the last year we've had at least 10 persons with 'suspicious' cases that were finally resolved using the test from Enterolab for both gluten (gliadin) and casein (the major protein in dairy). Many celiacs cross-react to casein.View Thread

Antibiotics can change the type and number of 'good bacteria' in the digestive tract while they're doing their job of getting rid of the infection. You may want to consider trying some probiotics - the good bacteria that should be in the GI tract. There are a number of good brands on the market that include Culturelle, PB8 and Digestive Advantage-IBS (not only for IBS) among others.View Thread

An_240615, I'm curious. I know you say she's had food tests, but specifically which ones were done? Some of the things you're mentioning like joint pain aren't something that should accompany IBS. Other GI conditions, yes, but not IBS. Does she get rashes at all? 'Brain fog?' How bad is the fatigue. What foods have they told her to stay away from. What other tests besides food testing has she had done?View Thread

I tried the drug for awhile many years ago. Unfortunately it didn't do much for me, although I do know of others that it did help. It should kick in fairly quickly if it's going to have a beneficial effect on you. It sounds like you should consider trying something else if a change in dosage isn't warranted.

The side-effects I found were feeling lethargic and 'flattened' in emotions.View Thread

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